


Graveyards and Tombstones

by Luscinnia



Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: Drabble, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-04-16
Updated: 2014-04-16
Packaged: 2018-01-19 15:30:35
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 534
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1474885
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Luscinnia/pseuds/Luscinnia
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Lestrade holds a conversation with his father- in- law he never got the chance to meet.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Graveyards and Tombstones

It always came down to this at some point. I saw so many leave, lost so many of them. Colleagues and friends, family members, loved ones.  
I know that my glass walls are still there. Lowered. Halfway up and greeting me with a sharp edge I run my fingertip along but there is no blood being drawn. It doesn’t need its redness, wet and rotting the moment it leaves the vein, to feel the pain.

Maybe this is the reason why I sought understandment from them. Those who answer in strange ways if at all. I’ve never believed in the supernatural, never believed in ghosts or spirits, fairies or trolls. I never believed. But what harm is there in trying? Silence is the worst that could answer and I’m used to silence as only reply.

 

I have the feeling there is no pause, no halt. I stumble from one tragedy to the next and in between are weddings and births, celebrations of old and new lives.  
I had been here with her just this one time, but I remember the way as if it wasn’t already over a year ago.  
The letters greet me, covered with faint raindrops from the mistiness that kept London under a cover of low clouds and greyness.

William Hooper.  
Beloved husband and father.

I doubt the lie, I whole-heartedly believe the truth in the second part of this one sentence. I saw Molly and how she spoke to him in silence; in her mind. Back then I couldn’t stand the sight and walked away just a few steps to be able to turn my back towards her. To be able to hide what I didn’t want her to see; my own vulnerability, the echo of my own losses.  
I never got the chance to meet her father in person. I met him only through her and her stories she told with warmth and fondness in her voice.

Here I am, William. Your son-in-law. I already know that you won’t speak with me like your daughter does. You are dead. She is alive. I don’t even know what exactly brought me here to your grave. But still and despite my conviction that you are nothing more than rotting flesh and bones, I thought you should know how your daughter is.

I tell him everything that happened. There is no need to palliate anything, her abduction, my bargains with Milverton, Kittredge.  
I speak about his granddaughter, about the new life; the unborn child in Molly’s womb. It dawns on me that I needed to come here to realise – again – that nothing can be all dark. It is not in my nature to give up or sit back and do nothing. William Hooper is just a dupe to remind myself of this.

It makes me smile to myself. You hoping fool, I tell myself knowing that the leopard cannot change his spots. May he try as hard as he wants.  
It must be a very disconcerting image as I stand here in front of a headstone and actually laugh out loud. “Thank you.” I tell William as much as I address myself.  
May my next visit to a graveyard be very far.


End file.
